Shoken to the foot?

[Dana Sheets]

So in sanseiryu is the technique of, having dropped your center, you perform what looks to be a classic gedan barai (low area sweep) with forward foot hand hand and retract your rear foot hand with both hands in shokens.

Principle 1 - a retreating hand should never leave empty
Principle 2 - if you see a shoken and it is not pointing straight forward, you're grabbing something.
Principle 3 - opposing forces - the two hands are applying force at off angles.

This little sequence is, in my mind at this time, Sanseiryu's balance displacement follow-up collage. Please remember I've barely started training this form and this just a reflection of my understanding right now of some options.

Back in Mejin era China - clothes for men were looser fitting. So for principle 1 it is easy to imagine one hand grabbing the stomach area and the other hand grabbing the scrotum area and then apply force. This isn't going to work as well against someone wearing jeans or tailored pants. So better for to go for principles 2 & 3.

Again with the retreating hand not leaving empty - you've gotten your center under theirs and distrupted their balance. Grab the heel and press on the knee. You can't just do this against someone standing there - you have to set it up. This is the follow that is shown in Kanei Uechi's Dan Kumite. Another nice pinch to the base of the Achilles tendon. Sensei James Thompson has a nice training he shows where you train to catch the heel of a kicker on the retraction of a front kick. The instant you have that heel in hand you can drop your center, hold onto the heel and gedan barai into the knee. If they don't fall straight down on their butt they usually start spinning off to the side. If you're faster you'll wrench their knee a bit before they twist away or fall down. So that's one way to think about it from a standing position and using the movement of dropping your center while grabbing something and applying the opposing forces.

And just for fun, an escape that was shown to me in my first month of training. Get someone to put grab your throat from the front with both hands. Apply the "sanchin" posture from just before the low stance series in the kata by pushing up with your palms against their elbows (ramp up your "push" outside the dojo to tweak the elbows a bit) while pulling your head back. Stepping back a little as you go will help straighten their arms and make it easier to lift them. Now follow up - if you want to pick one of the next moves from the kata you can shoot in under their arms for the takedown. You can displace their balance with a shove from your shoulder since you're so close. Or step on their foot and through their ankle for another *careful - that one breaks things*.

[CANDANeh]

The sweeping can also pick up a neck of someone going for take down and the throw now becomes a neck break. Also...can pick up an incoming arm. Or(I like this) simply a powerful rising forearm strike after using the "sweep" to clear incoming arm(s)

[Guest]

heel of a kicker on the retraction of a front kick. The instant you have that heel in hand you can drop your center, hold onto the heel and gedan barai into the knee.

I practice turning a front kick into a sidekick if my leg is caught. A sidekick, as you know, is slow, and easily detectable, but it is very, VERY powerful, and can be very effective, especially in this type of situation. Make sure you have a really good pinch on that achilles tendon, ok? There are some really good targets for a sidekick on your chest and it just so happens that your "kata position" chutes a leg directly into one.

[Dana Sheets]

Absolutely Tony - for every move there is a counter.

[Guest]

I was told that there is no way to counter the double shoken grab in Seisan, because it is too painful. I wasn't there but a Uechi master was questioned by a student in my ex-group about the shoken grab, and the master grabbed him on his belly fat and told him several times to hit him. As I understand it, the student was unable too. Wish i could have been there to see that. I wonder if the student even attempted to hit the master of karate.

[CANDANeh]

I was told that there is no way to counter the double shoken grab in Seisan, because it is too painful. I wasn't there but a Uechi master was questioned by a student in my ex-group about the shoken grab, and the master grabbed him on his belly fat and told him several times to hit him. As I understand it, the student was unable too.

No question...I could hit when pinched in that grab.

[Guest]

I dunno... the Uechi Master clearly showed that it was "impossible". Maybe there are a pair of BR549's right there that prevent you from poking someone in the eyes once the deadly shokens twist into them. Who knows?

[CANDANeh]

No question it hurts like heck as I been lifted off the floor receiving one of those love handle twisters. The Uechi master using the shoken twister would be a little immune to a violent out break much like mom twisting your ear (been there). Pain submission , ncluding pressure points often has limited effect on someone hell bent to stop the attack. Try a pressure point on a mom on route to save her child ( not literally please but just a point) A student is not considering the masters application as an actual attack (just a opinion from experience). Request to be hit may be accomadated from Joe Blow on street. Then again...been wrong before

[Guest]

The technique (if it even is a real technique, personally I think it was fabricated because no one has enough imagination to figure out what it really is) can easily be countered with an endorphin release.

[Stryke]

One persons pain compliance , is anothers motivation .

[benzocaine]

I had a 7 Dan show me the double shoken lift not as a grab fat and twist but as as two strikes in just under the pecs and in front of the Lats, and then it's a lift with the shokens. Try it. THe shokens point upwards in a 45 degree angle. It's not so much the person lifting but the pain of the pointy things pushing up into your ribs tah lifts and moves you.

I still prefer the fat pinch grab myself as the shoken lift is extremely precision oriented, and we all know what happens to precision under the dump.

[Guest]

This Bankai, in any of it's manifestations, does *NOT* work where there is a 205lb Italian Wrecking Ball barreling down on you.

Ten-Shin, Sabaki, yes; meeting force with force, no.

[JimHawkins]

Is the 'double shoken move' being discussed the one where two hands reach out and seem to move the opponent from your 12 o'clock to your 3 or 9 o'clock?

[Dana Sheets]

yep, that's the second one being discussed in the last few posts.

It isn't a good idea to think of the demonstration bunkai as the only movements you'll need to do to be successful. The bunkai movements are kind of like exploded mechanical drawings of principles. They're pulling something apart and letting you see it with a person stuck in there.

However it will still be up to you to be creative enough to apply those principles when a screaming 205 pound indivdiual of any nationalilty comes barreling at you. You might need to spit at them first, distract them with a conversation, fake at a different movement, soften them up a bit first with a few hits or kicks, etc.

A personal experience that sticks out in my mind is that I had never trained my judo throws against a punch. In judo we grabbed onto each other and then tried to get the throw. However once, very early on in my training before I had any level of skill in striking, someone was coming at me more quickly than I could handle in sparring. Out came his punch and the next thing I knew he was across the floor on the ground where I'd thrown him. Boy was I surprised.

So no - just grabbing someone around the waist and trying to throw them will probably not work alone against a non-compliant partner. But none of our skills are ever meant to be applied alone. They are applied in context, each situation with unique needs and none of them textbook. The flexibility and fluidity comes from our intelligence - not from a pre-arranged bunkai.

[jkolb]

I had a 7 Dan show me the double shoken lift not as a grab fat and twist but as as two strikes in just under the pecs and in front of the Lats, and then it's a lift with the shokens. Try it. THe shokens point upwards in a 45 degree angle. It's not so much the person lifting but the pain of the pointy things pushing up into your ribs tah lifts and moves you.

I still prefer the fat pinch grab myself as the shoken lift is extremely precision oriented, and we all know what happens to precision under the dump.

The video of Kanei Uechi shows these strikes as being in the pec range and not groin/love handles as a lot of people seem to do it. So maybe that supports this? It certainly seems more plausible as grabbing to far down leaves you more vulnerable. Just my two cents.